Carrots

Carrot cake is practically a religion unto itself in our house. We have it every year for Thanksgiving without fail, and there’s always at least one occasion, if not more, where it’s called for again during the year.

Personally, I love everything about carrot cake. There’s the quasi-healthfulness of it, given that one of its main ingredients is sugar carrots. There’s the delicious cream cheese icing, which is always a treat. Finally, there’s the rustic combination of multiple spices and nuts, giving it its unique taste.

We are, in short, fans.

So I was not at all surprised when Tim was paging through this month’s book looking for what he wanted me to make him for his birthday when he landed on the carrot cake page. Although I’ve devised and used (and shared many times) a full-proof recipe for carrot cake for a few years now, he thought it might be worth giving a different version a go.

As I was making this cake with my 10-year-old niece, she turned to me and said, “Vegetables in cake! There’s no way I’m going to eat this now that I know what’s inside it.”

Trust me, she changed her mind once it was brought to the table in all its magnificent glory.

How did this carrot cake stack up against the other cake we know and love and I’ve made dozens of times? Well…The reaction was decidedly mixed.

I’ll proceed in a Praise Sandwich, so that if David Lebovitz happens to read this, he won’t feel bad.

The Good Points:

•The cake was moist;

•The flavour of the carrot cake was delicious (albeit not different from the one I usually make, but still good);

The “Development*” Points:

*Euphemism for things we didn’t like

• The icing was a combination of cream cheese and mascarpone and a tiny bit of icing sugar. We didn’t like it at all. We much prefer the traditional cream cheese icing I made. Worse, because there was so little sugar in it and I couldn’t fit it in the refrigerator (see below), the icing went moldy after a few days and I had to throw half of the cake away. A crying shame, I tell you.

• The cake was huge. Huge. HUGE. Way too big, and I say that as a person who loves cake. Had it been a more reasonable size, I might have been able to fit it into the refrigerator. Then it wouldn’t have gone bad and I wouldn’t have had to throw half of it away. Not to repeat myself, but it really was a crying shame.

Finally, the other side of the Praise Sandwich:

• Everybody liked it. Even my niece who said she wouldn’t eat it when we were preparing it.

In short, while this was nice, I won’t be making this again. I’ll just revert back to my usual well-loved recipe.

Anna: This tastes and smells just like authentic Vietnamese. Or the Vietnamese food we used to eat in Sydney. Making this has taken me straight back to that restaurant we went to in Glebe with Edyta and Mark. We had the summer rolls and I’d never had anything like them before. Isn’t it brilliant that a smell can take me back to seven years ago like it was yesterday!

Peter: It does taste pretty authentic. It’s delicious.

Anna: It is, isn’t it? I love this. I love this type of food. If there wasn’t so much bloody chopping involved I’d make it every week.

Peter: Well I do like a good noodle so I’m happy for you to make it any time.

Nicholas (10): I love roast chicken. I bagsy* one of the legs. (For those readers among us who are unfamiliar with this fantastic British word, it means “claim”.)

Tim: I get the other one.

Maureen: Fair enough. What does everyone think?

Andrew: I’m not sure about the carrots.

Maureen: When you say, “not sure,” do you really mean, “I don’t like.”

Andrew (14): Well, no. Before I wasn’t sure. But now that I’ve had a few bites, I now know I mean I don’t like them.

Nicholas: I don’t like them either, and you know how much I like carrots.

Maureen: What don’t you like about them. Is it all the orange zest?

Nicholas: I guess so. I just prefer the other type you always make.

Maureen: OK. I’ll go back to the usual way the next time. I’ve been making that version, with carrots and honey, for years. That’s a Jamie recipe too. (Important note: I spent a good amount of time following this Sunday lunch trying to find exactly what Jamie book our beloved carrot recipe is from, but to no avail. So I’m pretty sure it’s a Jamie recipe, but now I have to proof to back it up. This is the problem with having more than 150 cookbooks. Things can get muddled over time.)

Tim: The chicken is good, but I can’t see how it’s much different from any other roast chicken we’ve had over the years.

Maureen: I think the ability to be creative with a roast chicken recipe is somewhat limited. This version is fine and it works. The good thing about it, particularly for less confident cooks, is it includes directions on all the side vegetables to have with it. That’s a nice touch.

Nicholas: Other than the carrots, which we already decided we didn’t like.

Maureen: Fair enough. (Looking at the nearly empty serving platter). There’s one problem with this recipe though: We’re supposed to get two meals out of it.

Tim: Ha! Well, we do have a teenage boy at the table, and we are greedy when it comes to roast chicken, so maybe that’s the difference.

Cook’s Notes: Once I followed Jamie’s instructions to the letter, I realised that amendments were going to have to be made, otherwise we were going to end up having a variation of brown water on top of our chicken. So after I added just plain water, and tasted the flavourless “gravy,” I added the necessary amount of chicken stock cubes. So if you do make this, don’t add 600 ml of boiling water, add 600ml of chicken stock. You can thank me later.)

Anna: Words cannot express how little I want to eat this. I feel like I’ve just fought a war with every pan and ingredient in the kitchen, and lost.

Ernie: Wow, this looks incredible. Do you eat like this every night?

Peter: Luckily, no.

Anna: Can I just point out that someone clearly didn’t proof read this book. Jamie says to ‘halve the chilli’. That’s it. Halve it. So I did. And put it in the frying pan. Sceptically. And five minutes later I had to pull the thing out of the frying pan to chop it up because really, that’s what you are supposed to do. Even though he DOESN’T SAY SO IN THE RECIPE. And. And. He calls for a small frying pan. What he means is a medium frying pan. You can’t get a whole packet of lentils in a small frying pan with spring onions and half a chilli and a squashed tomato. So I had to transfer everything halfway through cooking. And part of that bloody tomato went on the floor and my cashmere cardigan when I squashed it. What’s wrong with chopping eh Jamie?

Peter: Please excuse her. She’s having a rant.

Ernie: Well I think it tastes delicious. It is really different. It’s spicy and sweet. Very different.

Anna: Ah, this book. It reminds me a cooking in the flat a decade ago. We have cooked so much from this book and continue to do so to this day.

Peter: You’ve never done this chicken before though, have you?

Anna: I don’t think so. The first roast chicken recipe I ever made was from The Naked Chef. I think I just stuck with that, probably because this recipe requires half a pack of butter.

Peter: Half a pack of butter!?

Judy: Well I think it tastes delicious. Is this celeriac?

Anna: It is. A vegetable I wouldn’t normally use, but it is surprisingly good.

John: It’s all wonderful!

Anna: I was slightly disappointed that the potatoes and celeriac weren’t crispier. They didn’t roast so much as poach in the chicken juices. Which gives them a good flavour of course.

Peter: It’s hard to get a crispy celeriac I imagine.

Anna: What it did do though was minimise the effort and number of trays to wash up. Likewise the carrots were easy to prepare and you just bunged them in at the same time as the chicken. I won’t be making this again though.

Judy: Why not? It tastes lovely!

Anna: Too much prep required versus my usual chicken recipe. I use the River Cafe Easy one which is really quick and doesn’t use any butter either.

Peter: Phew.

Judy: What’s this sauce on the strawberries?

Anna: Balsamic vinegar and sugar. I love this recipe, have been making it for years. I’m sure I’ve done it for you before.

Judy: I’m sure you have.

Anna: It’s a great way to serve strawberries, particularly at this time of year when they aren’t really in season.

John: Well this was a delicious feast from Jamie. Or should I say ‘pukka’?